The Bride
by SirensLullaby24
Summary: No one wears black the day before their wedding. Short Leroux-based one-shot.


"Madame?" The girl at her bedroom door interrupted her thoughts. "Should I close the window? It's going to rain soon." Clutching her gray staff skirt, she hurried to hold the curtains lifted by the wind, which knocked over the bottles from the boudoir.

"Leave it…Jeanette?" Her voice was raspy and no servant could fathom how this fragile girl with the trembling voice could have ever been a diva.

"Jacqueline, madame," she responded shyly to her new mistress, who was hardly five years her senior.

"Forgive me."

Jacqueline could not bare to get closer to her. Her skin was too white and her blonde hair was tucked in a peculiar bun, unlike any other in fashion in Paris. Even though she did her hair every morning, frizzy tuffs always crowned her head.

The cook said she was mad, but the eighteen year-old maid had a hard time believing it at the beginning. However, now, it had almost been one month and a half that she had not once seen those glassy blue eyes concentrate on anything, it seemed quite possible.

Why would the master marry such a woman tomorrow?

The youngest members of the staff did not have much contact with the outside world gossip, but it was well known that she was a theatre girl, because of whom the Count Philippe had died. And everyone hated this newcomer for it, even though they knew no details of the little songbird's involvement. Besides, the Count's death was still fresh and the whispers abounded around the way the healthy dandy had met his end. Some said about drowning, the milkman in the morning said he was shot.

The housekeeper had even turned to the authorities, demanding to know the truth, saying the family name would be sullied if there appeared the mere suggestion of a scandal. The chief reassured her it had all been a tragic accident and that the Count had remained, until the end, an honest man.

"The master asks if you will join him for dinner tonight," she muttered with her eyes on the floor, although she already knew the answer.

"No, I'm not hungry tonight. Perhaps I'll grab something later." The way she stared at the wedding dress across her was terrible, as if the fabric would suddenly start to vomit spiders.

"Alright, madame. Good afternoon."

In the corridor, she met Camille, who was arranging the decoration of the house for tomorrow's party.

"What did she say?" asked full of curiosity her comically short coworker.

"The same," she shrugged, "and she still wears black. Whom is she mourning so much? Not even the master wears black any more and it was his brother that died. Who the devil wears black the day before their own wedding?"

Camille supported her basket on her hip and with her chin pointed at the door. "Old Madeleine is right to say she mad. Do you think she had something with the count and now the kid's marrying her to cover it up?

Jeanette hit her on the arm. "That's rubbish. The Count was thirty-five years older. He could have been her father. Anyway," she sighed and turned to the stairs. "Was to have a wedding in this dead house."

The star of that awful gossip had heard the whole conversation behind the door, but she had her own worries tormenting her. A week ago, Meg Giry had visited her, bearing a silver plater as a wedding gift, from her and her mother. She, of course, knew nothing of the whole affair and, when the bride to be had asked her, she replied that she would simply have to wait a couple days more.

"_Having blood on your wedding is good luck. You'll have many children!_" she had exclaimed, clapping her hands in excitement at the thought.

Now, though, Christine wasn't so sure. Every morning for almost a month, she woke up with her sheets clean underneath her and her worry grew. She couldn't do this to Raoul. To innocent and gentle Raoul, who had almost given up her life for her. How could she so shamelessly betray such a man?

This moral conflict left her mind very soon and was replaced by a more practical thought, as only a woman's in crisis can be. This child, how would it be? Because if it inherited her features, then no problem would there be, but if it was different? Her own mother once had dark hair, that could be excused, but how would she explain the betraying mark? The slightest imperfection on its infantile face would shout her sin.

And yet, she found it didn't sadden her as one would expect. Because, perhaps, in that case, she had no man to run back to, but a piece of him would always be with her. She could see him in her child's height, its raven hair. Maybe in its unprecedented voice or the brilliant talent. Or, even, the smallest things, the imperceptible things, those only a mother in her child can see. Maybe it would have his fast reflexes and lithe movements, the bright spark in its eyes or his dry sarcasm.

No, she did not wear black for Count Philippe. And tomorrow that she would take it off, her mourning would not cease. No, she did not wear black for her husband's brother. She wore black for the man who was taken from her, the man she had once loved.


End file.
